Good God. What a bunch of long, drawn out nonsense. I wonder how much a PR firm was paid to write that article in defense of the hospital, the drug maker, and to scare people enough into just paying for it. They finish the article with telling you about how your child will need it or get neurological damage in the ICU.

poe_zlaw:Good God. What a bunch of long, drawn out nonsense. I wonder how much a PR firm was paid to write that article in defense of the hospital, the drug maker, and to scare people enough into just paying for it. They finish the article with telling you about how your child will need it or get neurological damage in the ICU.

Everyone wonders why health care is so expensive in the US. This article explains a large part of the problem. FDA takes a drug that sells for $100 or less and pushes the price to exorbitant levels. Then the hospitals add their own exorbitant fees and says "Screw anyone who can't afford at least $10,000 a dose."

JuggleGeek:Everyone wonders why health care is so expensive in the US. This article explains a large part of the problem. FDA takes a drug that sells for $100 or less and pushes the price to exorbitant levels. Then the hospitals add their own exorbitant fees and says "Screw anyone who can't afford at least $10,000 a dose."

This is "not news" to anyone that works in the healthcare or pharmaceutical industries. To pass FDA muster, there is a multi-year testing process that a drug must go through to show that it is both effective and to identify any possible side effects. You ever hear those radio ads saying you can earn something like $2500 for taking part in drug testing? Those costs, as well as the other costs of the company running the testing, the lab testing costs, and more are all included in the final cost of a drug.

Earlier this year a man walking down the street in NC was bitten by a copperhead when he picked it up (it was small, and yes, he was stupid). The hospital bill for the antivenom shots came to $25,000, and I don't think his insurance covered it (being a rare medical condition and all). While I can see why antivenom shots are expensive since they are created from venom extracted from live snakes, is it $25,000 expensive?

Bendal:Earlier this year a man walking down the street in NC was bitten by a copperhead when he picked it up (it was small, and yes, he was stupid). The hospital bill for the antivenom shots came to $25,000, and I don't think his insurance covered it (being a rare medical condition and all). While I can see why antivenom shots are expensive since they are created from venom extracted from live snakes, is it $25,000 expensive?

looked up copperhead antivenom... http://reference.medscape.com/drug/crofab-copperhead-antivenom-crotali dae-polyvalent-immune-fab-ovine-343716retail price is ~$2500 for 2 vials.treating an adult is minimum 8 vials ($10k) and a maximum of 24 vials ($60k)

That's why you need to buy a separate "Just In Case" Venom Coverage Package!For the low-low price of only $300 extra per month, you and your loved ones will be *covered against the stings and bites of a myriad of beastly critters.

"javascript must be installed on your browser in order to view this site"So it can reload every 5s, suck up bandwidth with high-volume autoplay video clips, trap right clicks, show me twenty ads and generally make reading the story a miserable task?

Why is it that old media (newspaper, tv station) websites suck so fracking hard?Are they deliberately trying to destroy any remaining scrap of relevance they might have?

NightGuard:JuggleGeek: Everyone wonders why health care is so expensive in the US. This article explains a large part of the problem. FDA takes a drug that sells for $100 or less and pushes the price to exorbitant levels. Then the hospitals add their own exorbitant fees and says "Screw anyone who can't afford at least $10,000 a dose."

This is "not news" to anyone that works in the healthcare or pharmaceutical industries. To pass FDA muster, there is a multi-year testing process that a drug must go through to show that it is both effective and to identify any possible side effects. You ever hear those radio ads saying you can earn something like $2500 for taking part in drug testing? Those costs, as well as the other costs of the company running the testing, the lab testing costs, and more are all included in the final cost of a drug.

The final cost to the distributor, who pays $3500 in this case and charges hospitals $3750.

Now, how does the hospital get from $3750 to $40,000? According to TFA, by adding on all the money the hospital "loses" by accepting insurance companies' "discounted" payments and providing the drug to people who can't afford it.

Yet when called on this BS, the hospital manages to make a profit by charging "only" $8,000.

Gimme a break.

The FDA's BS is a big but relatively smaller factor. Why is all that regulatory expense necessary for a drug that's been used in Mexico at much higher volume for decades? If Americans can eat fruit from Mexican fields without years of testing, they should be able to get this drug without it too.

I don't mind paying for treatment but marking up common items is a everyday practice in hospitals.Example. Many years ago I cut my hand bad enough that I needed a few stitches to close the wound. Five stitches. $500.00. Doesn't seem bad until I requested and reviewed the bill. They tried to charge me for a IV I never had, drugs never given and $45.00 for a bottle of hydrogen peroxide. I spend an hour on the phone with billing going over every line items and how I wasn't paying for services and meds I never received and NOT paying 45 dollars for a 99 cent bottle on peroxide. They fought and I said fine not only not paying the bill but getting a lawyer to sue them they caved. Final bill $350.00.

Only reason they lower the cost is the media and I'm sure some lawyers got involved.

BarkingUnicorn:NightGuard: JuggleGeek:Yet when called on this BS, the hospital manages to make a profit by charging "only" $8,000.

Gimme a break.

The FDA's BS is a big but relatively smaller factor. Why is all that regulatory expense necessary for a drug that's been used in Mexico at much higher volume for decades? If Americans can eat fruit from Mexican fields without years of testing, they should be able to get this drug without it too.

Remember how everyone on Fark screams that companies are unethical and will do anything to make a buck, including putting poison in the local well water to. And Big Pharma is even worse, because they make drugs with side effects so they can sell other drugs for those effects.

Then realize that other countries don't even have the same level of ethics as U.S. companies. (For instance, how often do you see American companies adding lead into food products on purpose?)

Do you really trust a Mexican drug company to have a safe production line without constant oversight? Do you trust an American company to have a safe production line?

poe_zlaw:Good God. What a bunch of long, drawn out nonsense. I wonder how much a PR firm was paid to write that article in defense of the hospital, the drug maker, and to scare people enough into just paying for it. They finish the article with telling you about how your child will need it or get neurological damage in the ICU.

If I were that PR firm, I'd tell them we were charging them 80x our normal rate, since that seems to be the kind of thing they're into.

karlandtanya:"javascript must be installed on your browser in order to view this site" So it can reload every 5s, suck up bandwidth with high-volume autoplay video clips and generally make reading the story a miserable task?

Like all Gannett newspaper sites, they're going to a paywall business model. JS is apparently required for that.

Why is it that old media (newspaper, tv station) websites suck so fracking hard?Are they deliberately trying to destroy any remaining scrap of relevance they might have?

The people who are in charge of them are scared, they don't understand the Internet, and they're unwilling to listen to people who do understand the technical details.

Just think, the Govt used to fund the stuff FREE for the taxpayers(ZOMG socialism) till the Clinton administration discontinued the practice in the late '90s and the Shrub administration never restarted it.